Perspective
by The Reader of Words
Summary: "Dea del Focolare was a reporter, and an ordinary one at that. Excepting the brief tangle with a Famiglia some years back, nothing important ever happened to her, and she never expected that to change. Later, she thanked God every day that she was proven wrong." Little bit OC self-insert. I got a lot of Dea from myself. Please review on your way out.
1. Chapter 1

**Hello, my fellow Readers. So, I was trawling though the KHR! fandom looking for a story I remember reading but cannot remember the name of, involving Tsuna helping an injured-but-can-handle-himself Reborn, and Shamal coming into it later, and Tsuna and Reborn becoming odd friends, and Iemisu wondering about Tsuna finally spending the money he keeps sending, mistakenly thinking the poor boy had a romantic encounter of the intimate variety with and older, foreign woman. I'm certain it's complete, but I might've been on AO3. Meh. Anyway, while looking through the archive on here, I came across a fic that mentioned Tsuna knowing a clown OC. Then this hit me outta nowhere. And now, here it is. Because it seems like a good bit of angst, fluff and hurt/comfort. Ish. I don't know, but I hope you all enjoy it. **

**WARNING(S): This will likely all be in my OC's POV. Just so you know. ^-^ And I made up the newspaper, so don't think to go using it as a true one, if you're so inclined. Thank you. Any and all Italian will be translated at the end. If I missed one, PM me and I'll fix it.**

~O~O~O~

III

_I've heard it chilliest land -_

_And on the strangest Sea -_

_Yet - never - in Extremity_

_It asked a crumb - of me_

Dea del Focolare was a petite woman of five feet three inches exactly, with dark brown eyes that had been called black, dark brown hair that had been called black, and lightly tanned skin. She hated dark chocolate, was meh towards milk chocolate and was nuts about white chocolate. Though this was mostly in relation to peanut butter, which she'd sacrifice the chocolate for any day. Her dream was to turn her writing obsession into a paying career somehow.

As a reporter for Cronaca Quotidiano, one of the bigger newspapers in Italy, she had. At first. She'd been one of those wide-eyed idealist types when she'd started out, like so many, swearing she wouldn't turn out like her elder fellows whom only really cared for the deadline and their next paycheck, and family if they had one. She had no family (that she was speaking to, anyway. Her sweet Nonna and loving Nonno had passed away, Dio rest their souls, her Mamma had passed away of some terminal sickness she was too young to remember the name of, and her dear Babbo had turned into a cold-hearted jackass after her death. She and her sorellina weren't speaking due to an _Incident_, and the rest were cousins too distant to count as family), and she really only cared for those exact things.

However, there was a gnawing in her, that try as she might, she couldn't get rid of. She still wanted to help, to uplift her readers, bring them good and glad tidings, things to smile about. Thing was, aside from the odd person holding open a door for an elderly person, she never got anything. Not that that would, it was common courtesy, anyways.

It'd gotten to the point where even her Capo, Laborioso Ubriaco (he preferred being called just Oso for obvious reasons. _And never his last_ _name_. He fired people for that after the first warning. Word around the office was, his Mamma had said it right after he was born, and his Babbo was drunk enough not to notice she was talking to him, and he told the medico, who was sick of them both and just wanted them gone, to write that on the birth certificate. No one was brave enough to ask and he wasn't talking) who redefined 'asshole businessman' to most of his employees (the older ones mostly, he was as close to kindly encouraging as his codger, miser self could get with the newbies) was urging her to take a day, go out, have fun, get the stick out of her ass or the sand out of her craw, whichever would lighten up her 'doom-n-gloom' aura (she slapped him for the craw joke. He upped her pay again. Asshole).

Still, she was out and about, looking for something to do, to lighten herself up. Trouble was, she'd tried a great many things, all to no avail. Drugs, puppies and kittens, watching children play, eating ice cream (even her trustworthy Hot Fudge Pecan Royal didn't work. Poo), you name it she'd tried it. Until, that day she overheard a happy young couple talking about the circus in town.

_'Why not try?'_, was her optimism, urging her to go. Circuses were supposed to be a happy occasion. Maybe it'd help. _'Or it'll fail, like everything else. Why bother?'_, was her pessimism, already listing the number of things that could go wrong. An animal could get loose, one of the performers could fail in their act and get greviously injured, the food could be bad, the weather could turn for the worse (the clouds above were threatening to open up, she could tell), so many things, so why? Maybe she just shouldn't go-

_niggle_

- and she stopped, breathless for a moment. That hadn't happened in _years._

The thing she was talking about was The Feeling. It was almost like woman's intuition, except so much stronger. It had never steered her wrong, and for fifteen years it had made her the best reporter in Italy. Until . . . The_ Incident_ (_the one that had lost her her sorellina for so many years, her sorelina's fiancé, and come close, so very close, to taking all their lives_) where so many things had gone so right, and so many things had gone so, so wrong. After that, it was silent, and with it's absence went what made her the best. It had always felt as if she'd lost a piece of herself.

But that little niggle, that little nudge. It was that _feeling_, back. And it was wanting her to go. She'd never denied it, it had never steered her wrong, was the reason she was alive today.

So decided, she went.

_(A small bit of her, tucked way in the back of her mind, dared to wish that maybe, just maybe, she would see color in the world again.)_

_~O~_

Everything was monotone to her. Had been for sixteen years. Her world had been so gray, so repetitive since The _Incident_. (She wanted, so badly, to forget. But she'd hurt her sweet sorellina so terribly, ruined several lives, she couldn't. She wouldn't allow herself the mercy of forgiveness.)

The _Incident_ had happened about seventeen years ago, now. Dea had been a reporter for about a year when a goldmine had run straight into her, so far as her job was concerned. A bloody, vicious Famiglia, raging their way through the Underworld of Italy, obvious even to the oblivious; human trafficking, drug running, you name it, they were doing it. They were in the process of cutting a bloody swath though the heart of Venice when she stumbled her way though bringing them in. Those had been the most nerve-wracking days of her life.

After, when the high of victory had all but left her, she'd been visited by a kindly-looking older gentleman, and that would've been fine, except he reminded her of her Nonno. Now, her Nonno had been kindly, and gentle too. To his family, and his friends. To those who would threaten them, one unlucky burglar had found, he was as mean and vicious as a junkyard dog. As the men trailing him emitted _'dangerous, don't touch, stay away'_, which she very much wanted to heed, she rightly thought she was done for.

Imagine, then, her shock when the man shook her hand and, of all things, _thanked_ her. The man before her, it turned out, was the Nono Don Vongola, Capo of the largest, most influential and, they regarded sadly, bloodiest Famiglia in the world. The men in the Famiglia she'd tripped her way though putting behind bars had been small-time, but trouble causing enough that they'd been next on their 'to stamp out' list, which was when she realized. She'd only bought those men and women time, delayed their deaths. They would live, maybe a few more weeks, maybe a few more months, but they would die. These Vongola people would see to it.

(_Her faith in the general goodness of humanity had taken it's first, and greatest, hit that day_.)

Which is when her mouth said some things without consent of her brain. "The one named D'oro Tramonto. Will you leave him be, for the next month and a half?"

The kindly man, the Nono Vongola, had looked at her questioningly, almost incredulous. Knowing the fairly hefty list of crimes no one with a conscience would condone, she didn't blame him for the look.

Dea explained, not expecting that he'd do as she asked. "He's my sorellina's fiancée, and the reason I was able to bring them all in. He was their Capo's right hand, and worked with me to bring them in. As he committed so many unpardonable crimes with them, I can't plead his innocence. But I would ask that my sorellina at least get to say goodbye, once more. She will arrive back here in that time."

The Nono had looked at her consideringly. As if to measure her. As if seeing something he'd missed, before. "I will see what I can do."

Well. It wasn't an outright refusal, and all considered, she hadn't expected that (hadn't dared to hope). So, she curtsied, saying "Grazie."

He had looked startled, an odd look on such a powerful man. "For what? I have done nothing, and there may be nothing to be done."

All Dea did was smile, and say "Grazie." Tears were in her eyes, that she could see confused him. When she did not elaborate, he shook her hand (_a bit too warm for such cold weather, and had his eyes held some sort of amber fire-like glint in them_?) and left shortly after that, the dangerous men with him all glancing at her sadly, uneasily (_why? Maybe I should in . vest . . i . . .ga . . . . ssssssssshhhhhh)_. She paid them no mind.

She knew something had broken, when D'oro had come to her, half-crazed, confessing all. She knew her sorellina would hate her, and rightly so. She knew D'oro would not live. He knew, as well, in the corner of his mind that held to sanity, that clutched to her as his anchor, the last good link to his dearly departed sorella. But the Tramonto Famiglia had needed to go down, and she could feel the road to walk, that the Niggle led her to. For all the danger, the threat of death, she could not have, _would_ _not have_, refused that.

Now, the Tramonto Famiglia was all but gone, the mad, mad woman who'd led it, Crudele Tramonto, dead. The one who had whispered the beginnings of madness in her ears, breaking her unstable mind, malicious Cremisi Tramonto, dead. Benedetto Tramonto, who'd been D'oro's sorella, was the one who'd tried to get him away from Crudele's bloodied madness, who'd taught her unstable fratellino right from wrong in the midst of so much carnage. Benedetto, who'd been one of Dea's few friends. Whos death just months prior was suspicious enough Dea was not at all surprised when Crudele giggled her way though admitting to having killed the warmhearted woman before her execution. But she'd maybe bought D'oro time, and maybe her sorellina would not hate her for that. She prayed, but did not dare hope.

_It was slow, so slow and gradual she never really took note of it, but the world had slowly slid to grey-tone around her, until that was the way it had always seemed. The Niggle did not niggle, and she faded into the world's background._

_Until that day the Niggle came back, and led her to a circus. _

_Until the day she'd looked into warm brown, _flame-glinting_ eyes. _

_Until the day she'd seen her sorellina again, after sixteen long years_.

~O~O~O~

**Words meanings are gotten through Google Translate.**

**Dea del Focolare - Goddess of the Hearth. My favorite female character among the gods in the Percy Jackson series is Hestia. **

**Cronaca Quotidiano - Daily Chronicle. **

**Nonna - Grandmother.**

**Nonno - Grandfather. Interesting little fact? Nine is nove, and Ninth is Nono. Easy to lose what you're talking about in translation, there.**

**Dio - God. **

**Mamma - Mother, or Mom and Mommy, really. I really love my Mom.**

**Babbo - Father, or Dad and Daddy, really. God, I miss my Dad.**

**Sorellina - little sister. **

**Sorella - sister, older/big sister.**

**Capo - Boss**

**Laborioso Ubriaco - hard working drunk. I thought it was funny. **

**Oso - risk, dare, or attempt. You can see why he likes that more.**

**Medico - doctor.**

**D'oro Tramonto - Golden Sunset**

**Grazie - Thank you**

**Crudele Tramonto - Cruel Sunset**

**Cremisi Tramonto - Crimson Sunset**

**Benedetto Tramonto - Blessed Sunset**

**Fratellino - little brother**

****The poem at the beginning is part of one by Emily Dickenson. I've been wanting to use it in a story, and it seem to fit this one, somehow.** And the name of my made-up Familglia is because it was a time of down, a time of endings. It fit, to me. Tell me what you think of my OC's, because I've never written one before, nevermind a whole group. *gulp, loosens nonexistent tie* So. R****eview, review, review. **


	2. Chapter 2

**Hello, my fellow Readers. Holy shit. Three follows, three favorites, and it hasn't been a full day? I didn't expect that much from what was basically some background on an OC. I figured I'd probably better add more than that, so here you are. I'm still working on the third part, which will be significantly longer. And there may be more. But if there is, it will be in a new story, because three parts is all there is to that bit of poem by Emily Dickenson, and I want three chapters for the three parts of it. Anyway, here, enjoy. **

~O~O~O~

II

_And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard_

_And sore must be the storm -_

_That could abash the little Bird_

_That kept so many warm-_

_'It's a lot dingier than I thought it'd be'_, was Dea's first thought once she got inside the Big Tent. It was also packed with people, and she _hated_ crowds with the burning fiery passion of a thousand exploding suns. Still, the Niggle led her here. Disgruntled, and not a little pissed at the Niggle, she made her way to some seats. They were mostly deserted, but some in the middle were occupied by what looked like a group of businessmen in fine (_'very, very fine indeed'_, her naughty thoughts purred at all the handsome men. And the pretty woman, who was wearing a little black number that flattered her small form _very_ nicely, including the baby bump, and all the black brought out the sparkle of the gold on her ring finger, as well as the one on the man she was clutching to. Pity. Hey, she was bi, single, and unashamed. She could ogle all she wanted) suits. A very rowdy bunch, judging from the casual violence-

_-the Niggle just about screamed 'DUCK! GET DOWN, NOW!' at her, and she ducked immediately-_

_WHIZ-thwip-whip-thwip-THUNK_

-and all. Damn, that'd been a_ knife_ that went spinning tip-over-handle over her head. No wonder there was so much room around them. Dea was just about to exercise her rarely used self-preservation instincts that said to get the hell outta Dodge when the lights dimmed, and moving around right then would have been impolite. Mamma hadn't raised her to be impolite (for the little time she'd had with the kind, stressed blonde woman she remembered), and besides, the Rowdy Bunch were settling down for the show. _'Thank you, Dio'_, she thought as the spotlight focused on the ringmaster, and the show began. And, well. She had a knife now, if some weirdo bothered her.

~O~

Dea was feeling neutral toward the end, though she clapped politely with the rest of the audience. And though she wanted to leave, and get away from the Rowdy Bunch, who'd started up again, she stayed. The Niggle was urging her, telling her to listen to the group before her. _'Just be quiet, and listen. Listen, and hear'_, it said. So she would. It had never failed her. She trusted it. Thus, she_ listened-_

"-, really, I'll be fine. I just want to go talk to one of the performers, that's all. I don't need a bodyguard _here_, of all places. An assassin finding me in all this is as close to impossible as can be without actually being so. Besides, don't you have any faith in my abilities?" The messy-haired brunet man said exasperatedly to the silver haired main on his right.

"Of course I do, Juudaime, but-!"Silver-Hair protested, somehow vehement and meek at once. _'Juudaime is Japanese. Tenth Generation? Tenth Generation what?'_

"No buts. I'll just be a moment. Get everyone to the car, alright? I promise, I won't be long." And then Messy-Brown-Hair smiled, and _Mio Dio_, men weren't allowed to be that beautiful and still be mortal. Dea felt the oddest urge to hug the man, and ruffle his fluffy hair.

"Hn. Hurry, or I'll bite you to death, omnivore." Messy-Black-Hair said, sounding deadpan, threatening, and just the slightest bit sadistic, as if he were anticipating his not-order being ignored, and wanting the consequences. _'Ignoring what sounds like a routine death-threat with no, heh, 'bite' to it, omnivore? As in, herbivore, carnivore, omnivore? Interesting, does he fancy himself some kind of predator? He'd fit the carnivore bit more, so why would he 'bow' to an omnivore, an inferior? Given the general population tend to be sheeple more often than not, he likely doesn't have a great deal of patience, but I still kinda want to talk to him about that . . .'_

"I'll see you soon. _Go_." There was command in that meek-looking man's voice, not to be crossed. His Rowdy Bunch left, looking to be in various states of protesting leaving him alone. Amazingly, none of them even glanced at her, the strange woman so near their precious . . . whatever-he-was. Juudaime, she guessed, though of what, was the curious thing, there.

Then, he turned to her, (_she felt as if it were momentous, as if the world were turning on a fulcrum, out of sight_) smiling his beatific smile, saying "Will you come with me?"

For a moment, Dea just _stared_, so many things running through her head at his question (_'Cum with you how?'_ was the first one her dirty, dirty mind provided, followed by _'I like your cologne', 'I want to lick your face, and I want you to lick me in other places', 'why are you and all your friends so god-damned pretty?' 'please, pretty-man, can I hug you?'_). But, as he held out his hand, so gentlemanly, she looked into his warm brown eyes (ignored the flicker of flame-like orange, so reminiscent of the one that took her color away. He was warm, and kind, and the Niggle was going _'trust, trust, trust'_, and she just couldn't refuse that) and placed hers in his, so saying as if she were accepting an invitation to dance, "Of course."

He was a stranger, they'd never met, but it felt like the most natural thing in the world.

~O~

_Tsuna's POV_

She was a stranger, they'd never met, but offering his hand to her felt like the most natural thing in the world.

He hadn't thought, when he'd offered, he'd just turned and there she was, as if she were waiting. She was a curious thing, and he wanted to see her alone, without the others to cause a scene -he'd seen the knife she somehow dodged, and that was when his Hyper Intuition pinged at him - was part of his reason for this. That she'd accepted so easily was another ping, but nothing was dangerous, so his curiosity was eating at him.

The other was to thank the acrobat, because she'd done him a favor. Likely, she wouldn't remember doing so, it had been more than ten years, but it had been a low point (_he'd been looking at the various sharp object in the house, wondering if he'd be missed at all, and only the thought of his mother having to deal with the fallout of it had stopped him several times. By the skin of his teeth, once or twice. He'd filled the tub and held her razor, thinking about Okaa-chan's face, smiling. Okaa-chan's face, pale and tear-streaked with grief. The latter, more than anything, was why he'd stopped. He was at the beginning of another low point when Reborn sauntered into his life, and Tsuna thanked whatever god watched over him that he had_), and she'd made him laugh when he thought he'd forgotten how. He owed her, even if she never knew about the debt he could never hope to repay, he wanted to thank her.

He _needed_ to thank the woman called Catena del Focolare.

(_There was something about the beautifully plain woman on his arm. She was naggingly familiar, and he could not place her. They'd never met, he was sure. So why . . . ?_

_Even as he pondered, he didn't notice his Flames seeping into her, wearing away at the barrier there, allowing her to see, to hear, to smell, to taste, to touch, to really know the world around her again. He didn't, but he'd have approved. He never wanted anyone to be deprived of the world's color, the way he'd been._)

~O~O~O~

**Catena del Focolare - Chain of the Hearth.**

**Okaa-chan - Mommy, basically. I think Mom would be Okaa-san, or Kaa-san. Mother Okaa-sama, maybe. I'm not that good with the honorifics and suffixes, and Google has failed me on that front.**

**Sorry for the angsty, dark twist at the end. That came from nowhere. Review, review, review. Tell me how I'm doin', people. Talk to me.**


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